


The Window

by Faeriepool



Category: Peter Pan - J. M. Barrie
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-07
Updated: 2015-12-07
Packaged: 2018-05-05 13:26:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5376914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Faeriepool/pseuds/Faeriepool
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Wendy promised to always leave her window open? What if she forgot?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Wendy

Wendy gazed out her window after Peter and wondered when she would see him again. Her family rejoiced behind her, but she was deaf to their merry making as she stared into the night, until Nana pulled her back into the fray. She hugged her parents as she and her brothers promised to never run away again. To Wendy, those promises were hollow. She had already pledged to remember and follow Peter Pan if he ever again came through her window. 

So the window was left unlocked.

Her adventure in Neverland stalled her father for a little while as he and Mrs. Darling celebrated the return of their children. However, three months after her return, Wendy was moved out of the nursery. She now had a room of her own, and no one was allowed in without her permission. She still played with her brothers of course, but now she would leave the nursery for her own room after story time, instead of crawling into bed with them. Despite the changes, Wendy still walked through her days to the sound of faerie bells and left her window unlocked. Still waiting for her sprightly friend.

The years passed and many things changed. John and Michael moved out of the nursery as well, and stopped asking for stories, claiming they were too big and grown up for such nonsense as faeries, mermaids and pirates. Wendy grew as well and her bookshelves, once filled with once upon a times and faerie dust, were now cluttered with makeup, magazines and other superficial nonsense. Wendy began to forget about Peter and her promise to remember, dismissing them away as a dream too silly and fanciful to be real. She took to latching her window most nights, wondering why she ever left it open in the first place. Still, something pulled at the back of her mind and Wendy would unlatch the window the next morning, though only to "air out the room" of course.

And so, the years passed.


	2. Peter

Peter was happy. He had been very busy cleaning up the pirate's mess and taking care of the Lost Boys, but everything was finally put to rights and so he was finally free to do as he pleased. Leaving Tink behind to watch over the Boys, Peter flew off into the night.

First stop was the Darling house. Only a few months or so had passed (one must remember, time passes differently in Neverland) and so he expected to find  
Wendy and her brothers in their nursery, perhaps still awake and telling stories if he was early enough. He was certain though, if they were asleep, they would not begrudge his waking them. They liked his adventures too much to stay mad.

When Peter got to London, it was already dark and so was the house on the corner. He peered through the nursery window and was startled to see that Nana's doghouse was gone and the only bed in the room was Wendy's, now sporting a young boy who looked nothing like John or Michael. Peter was confused. Where were John and Michael? Why was there a stranger in Wendy's bed? Most importantly, where was Wendy? He went to open the window to investigate, but found the glass would not move! The window was latched! Worried now, Peter flew over to Mr. and Mrs. Darling's window to see if he could get in there, but found the room empty and the window once again locked.

He began to frantically fly around the house looking for an occupied room, until he found one across the hall from the nursery. Inside was a young couple sitting on a large bed, looking down on the bassinet that sat beside it. The woman looked vaguely familiar, but did not notice Peter. The window in this room was locked as well, so Peter began banging on it, trying to catch the couple's attention. They did not move however, until the banging woke the toddler in the bassinet, who then started hollering.

The woman picked up the child and rocked her as she walked towards the window, assuring the tired toddler that it was only a branch knocking the windowpanes. The little girl insisted in a sleepy babble that there was a boy peering in, a boy with wild red hair and tattered, patchwork green clothes. When they reached the window, the woman paused, keen blue eyes searching for what her daughter had seen. Peter stared at her as hard as he could; hoping she would see him and help him make sense of everything. For a brief moment he though he saw a flicker of recognition in the woman’s eyes but after a few seconds she shook her head and turned away from the window as her husband called out to her, "Come back to bed Wendy, Sarah probably just imagined it. She'll settle down in a moment." 

Peter Pan stared in shocked silence as Wendy put her child to bed and climbed into her own. At that moment, a heart-breaking realization hit him. Wendy had broken her promise, for she could not see him, and the window was locked.


	3. Sarah

He knew she had forgotten. He knew it was better, for both his heart and sanity, if he stayed away, but he couldn’t. Wendy was the first person other than Tink and the Lost Boys, to believe in him whole-heartedly, so every few months he would return to stare through the windows of the Darling house longingly.  
Not that it was called the Darling house anymore. Wendy had married a strapping young lawyer named Edmund Smith and the house was now in his name, as were their two children, Jack and Sarah.

As the years stretched on, Peter continued to visit the Smith residence, but as time passed, it was less to see Wendy and more to see her children. When Wendy was a teenager, she told her neighbour, Mr. James M. Barrie, about her and her brothers’ adventure in Neverland, recounting it as a bedtime story she had created for her brothers. Mr. Barrie had been delighted by the story and had had it published under his name, and the story was a staple in the Smith home. Jack and Sarah would beg their mother to read them Peter Pan almost every night, regardless of how many times they had heard it before.

Wendy would smile fondly as Jack recounting dreams of slaying pirates with Peter most mornings, but when Sarah was asked about any Neverland dreams, she always became standoffish, saying that Neverland was not a story, but rather a real place where time was stilled and dreams come true. Wendy would then get a wistful look in her eyes as she remembered a time when she believed as strongly as her little girl did. Pulling herself out of her thoughts, she would shake it off and laugh, patting her disgruntled daughter’s head as she remarked that if the whole world had as much faith as Sarah did, it would be a much better place.

Peter often missed moments like these, having flown back to Neverland at the break of dawn. It would have done his heart good to know that someone still believed in him. Seeing no point in causing himself more pain than necessary, Peter usually flew to the nursery window after the children had been put to bed and left just as the sun rose in the sky, not wishing to see their familial happiness, knowing that he could not join them. He always stayed the whole night though, just floating by the window or playing his pipes on the sill; playing guardian angel to Wendy’s children, whom he had never met, yet were so close to his heart.

One night however, Peter got to the window earlier than usual. Slightly had gotten in trouble with the Indians and Peter had been too fed up to deal with him, so he left for England early. The sun was only just setting as Peter neared the Smith house and for the first time in years, Peter saw the children more than half-awake. Jack had already climbed into bed, but Sarah was standing in the middle of the room in her forest green nightgown, arguing with her housecoat-clad mother. They were speaking loud enough that Peter could hear them through the window.

“You will do as you’re told Sarah Jane Smith!” Wendy growled in frustration, “It is winter, it is cold and the world is not as friendly a place as you seem to believe. That window is to stay latched every night unless I tell you otherwise. Do you understand!?!?”

“Yes mother.” Sarah ground out in a faux calm voice, gritting her teeth, “I understand.”

“Good, now get into bed.” Wendy said as she went to the window and hooked the latch, which had until this point been undone. “Goodnight Jack, darling, goodnight Sarah, dear.” She said softly as she walked out of the nursery, turning out the light as she went.

After a few minutes, Sarah sat up in her bed and peered around the dark room with a clear, sleep free gaze. Jack had fallen asleep quickly as he always did and it would take a bomb going off to wake him now. Keeping an ear out for her parents, Sarah slipped out of her mother’s old bed and quietly padded over to the window seat. Sitting for a moment, she closed her eyes and folded her hands as though in prayer before opening her eyes and searching out the second star to the right. Smiling, she began to talk to the thin air.

“I do not know if you’re there, but if you are, you must be bored of hearing me talk all the time, but I have missed you. I always sleep better knowing you are there, your pipes are so soothing. I wonder if you have been off having a new adventure for me to add to my storybook. I do hope the snow does not bother you out there.” With a fond smile, Sarah began to turn away from the window and get back into bed, flicking the window latch up as she went. Pausing before she climbed back under the covers, Sarah turned to look over her shoulder at the window once more and called softly, “See you tomorrow night Peter.”

Peter was sitting still as stone above the window where he had fled when Sarah neared the window. She was talking to him. She thought he was real?! How many times had she done this? How many times had he missed her, arriving late enough that she had already returned to bed? A sudden thought struck him. Sarah had unlatched the window as she walked away, despite her mother’s orders. How many time had the window been unlocked and waiting for him to pluck up the courage to try to open it?!

Thoughts slowly driving him mad, he flew down from his hiding spot and perched lightly on the sill, cautiously eying the nursery window. He gently nudged it with his foot, barely daring to believe it when the glass budged. Surer of himself, he pushed on the glass fully and entered a room he had not been in in nearly twenty years. It was different now. Nana’s doghouse had been replaced by a toy castle and where Michael’s cot once sat now stood a large bookshelf bursting with storybooks. Scanning the titles, Peter noted some of his favourites that Wendy had read when they first met all those years ago. Looking down the shelves, he noticed that there was one book missing from the collection, one that was very important in the Smith household from what little he had seen of their waking hours.

“It is right here,” A voice called out softly from behind him. Turning quickly, Peter was startled to find Sarah sitting up in bed staring at him fondly with a soft smile as she clutched a large illustrated version of Peter Pan to her chest. “I keep it under my pillow. I never sleep without it.”

Approaching Sarah warily, Peter took her in properly for the first time. She had her mother’s face, but long back curls poured down her back instead of brown waves and a pair of bright green eyes stared into his brown ones.

Smiling, Sarah quietly repeated the very words that had started the adventures long ago. “Boy, why are you crying?” she asked with a soft smile, as Peter reached up and touched the wetness on his cheek in shock.

“I guess I have been lonely.” He said hesitantly as he took her hand in his own and led the unresisting eight-year-old over to the windowsill as he had her mother so many years before.

“Well that will not do.” she replied with a teasing smile as she stepped onto the sill with Peter, gripping his hand tighter and preparing to leave her world behind. “My name is Sarah Jane Smith and I think it’s time for your loneliness to end.”

“I’m Pet-“

“Peter Pan.” Sarah said, cutting him off gently, “I remember you. You are my best friend, my guardian angel.”

Staring at her in shock for a moment, Peter flashed Sarah a blinding smile and took them flying off into the night. As they neared the second star to the right, Peter could not help but think that this time was going to be better than the last. This time, instead of someone using him to run away from their problems, he had a friend who had been waiting for him and always would.


End file.
